I use convincing words to invoke consensus as a defense and to halt further investigation. As a conjunction, the word “so” means, “and for this reason; therefore.” (Google) “Because” as conjunction means, “for the reason that; since.” (Google) “Then” and “therefore” conjunctions essentially mean the same as “so”.

Separation hurts. I don’t like it. I think it would be SO cool to be whole and to live in wholeness, oneness. You might say I aspire to that great and lofty goal. Besides, it sounds pretty amazing to say, “I AM WHOLE.” Especially coming from a background in which one is expected to earn their way in the world – honoring the struggle. It’s what I’ve come to believe in. And yet, now I question, “Is it true?” Hmmm… I wonder…

What I believe in, I defend. When my belief in being separate is challenged, I defend it by imagining “me” separate from “not me.”

I don’t see my behavior as defensive. Rather, I view what I do as being proactive towards self-preservation and my only means of saving myself from disappearing completely. To me, the sacrifice of “me” was in the becoming “not me.” I felt compelled to separate self from oblivion.

As we’ve discussed before, I’ve gotten pretty good at misattributing a cause to an effect – mostly due to the fairly complex nature of nature and my willingness to apply reductionism rather than take the time to fully understand my world.

Time to have some fun with that… using intentional misattribution.

Turning Cause and Effect on Its Head – the Misattribution Games

Let’s start by looking at the word “because” – in English, the word “because” joins together cause-effect relationships. Something is so BECAUSE something else is so. Some action occurs BECAUSE something else happened or is so:

Effect –> BECAUSE –> cause.

The underlying belief is that I can determine THE cause by observing AN effect. The inverse holds true, too: that I can determine outcome from cause (a known action will result in a known outcome) – BECAUSE I do a certain action, I know what SHOULD occur.

I had a sort of death grip on my cause-effect relationships – my “shoulds.” I needed something stronger than a wish to break them.

In the following games, I challenged my most treasured and sacred cause-effect (if this then that) relationships, exposing them to my conscious awareness and no longer operating quite as automatically. And I had some fun while I was at it.

In our last post we discussed that when I attach fear to an event or person, then seek to justify my fearful judgment, which validates and amplifies my fear, I get mired down into circular thinking. What might I do to break out of a fearful thinking vortex before I get pulled down the misunderstanding drain. Remembering that education tends to dissolve fear, I could benefit from learning more about the real nature of my world.

When I attribute a motive to a behavior I observe in another, I draw that attribution from my beliefs. I THINK I understand why another person did what they did, yet I have actually judged myself as I have imagined ME doing what the other person has done in that context.

That’s Because…

My experience is my perception of my experience. My perception of your experience is still my perception of my experience (of your experience). Same goes for the experience of any and all others and any and all things I observe in my universe. The common element is – “MY perception of MY experience.”

All that I attribute to causes outside myself is a window into myself.